SOPUDEP's Newest Students Still Live On The Streets
SOPUDEP School’s mission has always been to help the poorest children in their community of Pétion-Ville and although they have had children facing all dimensions of hardships, including ex street children and Restevak’s (child slaves), they have never had students with no place to call home. On January 16th the school opened its doors to six homeless boys ranging in age from 12 to 17 to whom they were made aware of by a local activist only weeks prior. School Director and Founder Rea Dol explains that they have always wanted to include the street kids of their community and with classes now running seven days a week and the children they took in from the recent tragic collapse of La Promesse school they felt the timing was right. Although SOPUDEP is now giving these young men an education in hopes to set them on a new path and meals from their hot lunch program they simply cannot afford to board them.
Giving them a real home would dramatically change these children’s lives as they could concentrate on their studies and not have to worry if their school supplies might be stolen. It would offer them security they have never had. When I asked how much it would be to rent them a home, Rea said because they want to bring in both boys and girls off the street a two-story apartment they have looked at would cost $5000 US for a three-year contract.
Ryan Sawatzky
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The Students And Their Life On The Streets Of Pétion-Ville
Dieumerite John
I am 17 years old. I have been in the street since 2004. I wash cars and beg for money. I make around 50 gds ($1.25US) a day. My Father died just after the coup that overtook Jean Bertrand Aristide. Since then I have to work and live on the street to take care of my sisters and brothers back home. My Mother can’t work because she is handicap, no leg.
Dieusel Francois
I am 17 years old. I have been in the street since 2002. I wash cars and move things for people (carry boxes). I sometimes make 100 gds ($2.50US) a day. My Father is in the street too doing the same thing I do. I send money to my mom who lives in the countryside (Belle-Anse). I have four brothers and two sisters to take care of. I do drugs, cigarettes, and alcohol. I need someone to help me. Going to school is something that I want, but I don’t know what school is.
Dimeus John
I don’t know how old I am. My Mother and Father are dead. My friends told me that. I never knew them. I don’t know how long I’ve been in the street, since I was a little kid I guess.
Dimeus doesn’t remember anything about himself, one of his friends told us his family was killed by gangsters in 2002.
Eveque Elisaint
I am 15 years old. My Father lives in the countryside (Belle Anse). I have been in the street since 2003. I came from my hometown to Port-au-Prince. I make around 100gds a day by washing cars and begging for money. I have two sisters and I support my Mom back home. She can’t work because she is blind. I want to go to school and have a place to live!
Jean Fritz Juste
I am 15 years old. I left school when I was five years old. I remember that and I came to the city with my friend on the back of a bus. Since then I have never gone home or had a chance to go to school. I really do want to go to school! I work in the street, ask people for money, and sometime have to steal to eat. I don’t know my Mother, but she lives in the countryside. I wouldn’t go back to live with her because she can’t support me and I want to go to school.
Jean Jean Francois
I am 12 years old. My Dad is dead and my Mother is mental. Jean Fritz is like my Father. He is the one that helps me on the street. I don’t have work yet, I just beg. Sometimes I don’t even have Jean Fritz to give me food. I want to go to school to have a better life!
Some Background On Street Kids
The children adopt the lifestyle of the street for various reasons: poverty, urbanization, political instability, natural disasters, the disintegration of their families, AIDS, and violence, whether it is physical, emotional or sexual.
The children who live and work in the streets of Pétion-Ville are often victims of violence and sexual abuses. They are neglected and are sometimes addicted to drugs. The kids we have taken in at SOPUDEP are victims of violence and some have friends who have been killed by police officers or by other representatives of authority who are supposed to be protecting them. Those, who still have contact with their family, work on the street to sell water in plastic bags, polish shoes beg for money or wash cars in hopes to increase their parent’s income. Some of their parents were made handicap after President Aristide’s kidnapping and the coup takeover in 2004; their parents had hands and legs cut off or were even blinded.
The majority of these children give up school before their fifth birthday and some have never been at all. Those, who do not have family contacts, often for safety form a family with other children. They try to earn their living by selling small objects or by carrying out manual work. When they do not have another choice, some children, who do not have any attachment with their family, will ensure their survival by turning to robbery or prostitution.
The children of the street that prostitute themselves are mainly girls, but there are also boys. Why? They desperately are in need of money to support themselves and their families at such a young age.
I have been interviewing some of the young girls on the street. Here is one response I got from a young lady when I asked her why she was living here.
“I am in the street because my family needs me for money, I seek their attention, which I do not receive, and my father forces me to bring home money for my other sisters and brothers which I have who need to eat.”
Nearly 90% of the children of the street have substance abuse problems, in particular, alcohol, cigarettes, heroin, and industrial products easily accessible, like shoes adhesive (cement), and paint thinner. The powerful fumes from these dangerous solvents affect the part of the brain that signals the feeling of hunger, cold and loneliness. The solvents enable them to escape reality. However, these brief moments of euphoria have serious psychological and physical repercussions for the children.
After few questions we asked them about their health condition, it’s bad to hear it and I am telling you they are suffering some serious health problems. Some of them are suffering from hallucinations, pulmonary edema (liquid accumulation and puffiness of the lungs), impaired renal function, irreversible brain damage, and, in certain cases, sudden death.
The young people of today form the most important generation to reach adulthood. From present to 2025, six towns out of ten in Haiti will have have vanished in less than eighteen years due to under education, leaving them unable to properly manage what little resources they have that have not been taken away from them. To be unaware of the rights of the children of the street endangers human development everywhere in the world especially here in Pétion-Ville Haiti; the children of the street deserve our respect. We must hear their voices, listen to their stories, and draw from their lessons. It should be recognized that these children and these young people are full of imagination, desires and hopes and that they must share in the decisions that will influence their life.
One of the children of the street said to me as I was interviewing them on their first day of class:
“We, the children of the street are alone. There is nobody to look after us, nobody to comfort us when one of us dies, but we are also free to make our own choices. You came to rescue us, I thank you, and I feel free to make a good choice now.”
(On attending SOPUDEP School)
Thelius W. Rosier
Assistant, SOPUDEP School